michael montgomery, reporter for kqed and center for investigative reporting, and moore, professor of law. the u.s. supreme court convened today behind closed doors discussing whether or not to review a lower court ruling striking down california's proposition 8. their highly anticipated decision could come monday. as you well know, the supreme court gets seven to eight thousand requests for cases to be reviewed. how do they decide? they only pick 80 or so a year. what is the criteria and why would prop 8 be an important one to look at? >> it's how legal the precedent is and how national the question is, how many people it affects, and relatedly, how much lower courts are struggling over that and related questions. so in the prop 8 case, it's true the prop 8 is a california-specific measure, and it's also true that a ninth circuit ruling tried to make its ruling non-specific. california is such an important state and it occurs in dozens of other states and that's why it might have some appeal for the supreme court. >> as you said, the ninth circuit narrowed it down, but when the court